Harold M Ickes

The Clinton administration's legal woes expanded Tuesday as former White House aide Harold M. Ickes became the latest possible target of an independent counsel's probe. Atty. Gen. Janet Reno opened a preliminary inquiry to determine if an outside prosecutor should investigate whether Ickes, former White House deputy chief of staff, committed perjury in Senate testimony last year concerning a labor dispute between the Teamsters Union and Diamond Walnut Growers in California.

The Clinton administration's legal woes expanded Tuesday as former White House aide Harold M. Ickes became the latest possible target of an independent counsel's probe. Atty. Gen. Janet Reno opened a preliminary inquiry to determine if an outside prosecutor should investigate whether Ickes, former White House deputy chief of staff, committed perjury in Senate testimony last year concerning a labor dispute between the Teamsters Union and Diamond Walnut Growers in California.

Atty. Gen. Janet Reno appears unlikely to seek an independent counsel for campaign-related questions involving President Clinton and Vice President Al Gore, Justice Department officials said. A decision not to seek an independent counsel would be a major legal and political relief for Gore as a lengthy investigation could have posed significant problems in his bid to win the presidency in the 2000 election. It also would be a boost for Clinton.

President Clinton revamped the upper reaches of his White House staff, replacing a cadre of campaign heroes with newly promoted advisors loyal to incoming Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles. As the president turned his focus to four remaining Cabinet vacancies, Bowles promised that the staff will hum with the efficiency of a business. But Bowles demonstrated that he can throw an elbow or two: He nudged out the current deputy chiefs of staff, Harold M.

A member of the Senate committee winding up a probe of campaign fund-raising abuses predicts that panel Republicans will recommend perjury charges against several Democratic witnesses. Among them could be Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt; Harold M. Ickes, former White House deputy chief of staff; and ex-Democratic National Committee co-chairman Donald L. Fowler, said Sen. Bob Smith (R-N.H.). The Senate Government Affairs Committee suspended its campaign-finance hearings last week.

Hillary Rodham Clinton made a pilgrimage Saturday to the home of her hero, Eleanor Roosevelt, a former first lady who declined a challenge the current one has taken on--a run for the U.S. Senate from New York. Clinton came to Val-Kill, Roosevelt's cottage home and a national historic site, to announce that $150,000 has been raised through private donations to help with preservation.

By all accounts, there were no secrets between Harold M. Ickes and President Clinton when Ickes was deputy chief of staff. But the New York lawyer had a surprise for Clinton and his former White House colleagues: Without telling any of them, he took a trove of sensitive political documents when he left his job last month.

Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack told Democratic leaders Friday that he may seek the party's top job as the jockeying to replace Chairman Terry McAuliffe intensified. Vilsack, an ally of presidential nominee John F. Kerry, telephoned several Democratic National Committee members as he traveled in Europe, seeking their advice and asking them to withhold their endorsements of any candidate until he decided whether to seek the job.

Deputy Treasury Secretary Roger Altman disclosed that he held a second meeting with White House officials about matters relating to a defunct Arkansas savings and loan linked to the Whitewater affair, a letter released Friday shows. Altman, who has been acting head of the Resolution Trust Corp., said he met with White House aide Harold M. Ickes last month to discuss disqualifying himself from the case involving Madison Guaranty Savings & Loan.

Former Clinton aide Harold M. Ickes and former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk let top Democrats know Tuesday that they would not be running for chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Kirk, who made an unsuccessful run for the U.S. Senate in 2002, wrote a letter to committee members Tuesday saying he would not run but was endorsing fellow Texan Martin Frost, a former congressman. "Martin is ...

Denouncing attacks on his integrity as "uncalled-for and unwarranted," Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt told a House committee Thursday that he is being victimized by "a half-baked theory of improper political influence" involving his department's rejection of a proposed Indian gambling casino in Hudson, Wis.